Ex Machina III
by JBean210
Summary: A long time ago, after the defeat of Voldemort, Professor Dumbledore went on a vacation with Professor James Monroe, the two men who had most influenced Harry Potter. They never returned. A very old Harry has been alone for many years. It's his birthday!
1. This Old Man

**Ex Machina III**

**Chapter One**

**This Old Man**

The old man walked slowly from his bedroom into the kitchen of his old, comfortable house. He was very old, but his slow walk was mostly due to his lack of hurry rather than any inability to move about. With a moment's concentration, he could be anywhere in his in a split-second, but he usually preferred comfort to quickness.

In the kitchen, the first thing he did was take a glass from a cabinet and draw some cold water from the icebox, then slowly drank it. The chill liquid was refreshing on this warm morning. A warm shower had removed a few dull aches from his bones, but he didn't really feel ready to face the day until he'd something to drink and a hearty breakfast. Normally, at his age, a filling breakfast would be a chore, but…

He stepped over to the Clarke, his one concession to the advances of technology. Well, he reminded himself, his _biggest_ concession — he was actually living in a house that virtually ran itself. The Clarke was a rectangular-shaped box with two doors in it; the top one fronted an enclosure the size of a large microwave, roughly eighteen inches wide by fifteen inches deep and tall. The lower area was taller, perhaps thirty inches in height. Its instruction manual had said that it could fabricate anything, given the proper raw materials and instructions. It was a handy device, Harry had to admit, though he only used it for meals.

"Good morning, Harry," Clarke said when he stepped up to it, rubbing his chin as he pondered what to eat that morning. His fingers felt a bit of stubble; he'd forgotten to shave that morning. Well, no matter, it was not like he had anywhere to go today. Or tomorrow, or the next day…

"Morning," Harry mumbled. He was not usually in a talkative mood this early in the morning, but the Clarke was a chatty little device, and if he seemed unusually laconic or uncooperative it got very fussy over him, so he tried to put on a veneer of cheerfulness around it. "How are you today?" _You big steel worrywart_.

"I'm operating quite well today, thank you for asking!" Clarke replied, cheerfully. Harry shrugged, having expected exactly that response. "Is there anything I can do for you, Harry? I notice it is nearly your usual breakfast time."

"Yes, I'm hungry this morning," Harry told it, and this was the truth: he _was_ feeling a bit empty. "I could probably eat a hippogriff!"

"I'm afraid I don't have any recipes that require a hippogriff as one of the ingredients," Clarke said apologetically, making Harry smile. It didn't quite get certain nuances of humor. "Perhaps you could try something else today, and I will check with the central database to see if there any recipes I can download."

"Don't bother," Harry said. "There aren't any hippogriff anymore — at least, none on Earth." Most magical creatures had been transplanted from this world decades ago, during a period of high tension between several countries that had each claimed exclusive ownership of species of magical creatures found primarily within their borders. It had taken the president of the International Confederation for Magical Creature Preservation, Luna Scamander, to come up with a solution — she and a group of wizard naturalists had devised a plan to move all magical creatures to several planets in star systems near earth. Each planet's new ecology was carefully planned to balance the different magical creatures placed there, and no world was the sole haven of any particular species. Human populations on each of these worlds was minimal, staying there primarily to monitor conditions for the animals, and doubled as guides and lecturers for visitors wishing to observe the creatures living there. If she was still alive, Harry knew, Luna would still be giving lectures and tours on the world she was on, and her children with her…

Harry sighed. He hadn't thought of any of the old crowd in some time. He couldn't remember the last time he thought of Luna, or Neville Longbottom, who'd come close to marrying her but ended up marrying Hannah Abbott some years later. He hadn't thought of Ron Weasley, his "partner in crime," and fellow Auror, whom he'd partnered with for many years, or his twin brothers Fred and George. He hadn't even thought of Ginny, their only sister, and the woman who'd given him many happy years of marriage. But he had thought of one person…

Harry turned, looking into the front room, to the chair he sat in every day, and the small , spindly table that sat next to it with a single framed photograph placed in its center. A smiling woman with brown hair and brown eyes that he looked at every day, a non-magical picture that did not move or speak because Harry did not think he could bear it if she did. He missed her terribly.

Hermione.

Harry looked away, trying not to let his emotions get carried away with him again. It was too easy to pine for her, too easy to slip into tears and depression, and then he did nothing but wander aimlessly around the house, thinking about her and their times together, until he became too sad to do anything but lie in his bed until Clarke pested him to get up. In fact, he could almost hear its artificial voice now.

"Harry, did you hear me?"

Harry started. He _had_ heard Clarke's voice! "Uh, sorry, Clarke, I was thinking," he said, trying to cover his mental lapse. "What did you say?"

"I asked what you would like for breakfast."

"Um." At least he was still hungry. "Some eggs, I guess — scrambled. And some bacon, some bangers, some oatmeal, and some toast."

"Would you like me to proportion items those for your standard breakfast calorie allotment, sir?"

"Since you're going to anyway," Harry said flatly, "yes."

"You know me so well, sir."

"I should — I programmed you."

"Actually, your great-grandson George last programmed me, sir."

"He did?" Harry exclaimed, surprised. "When did he do that?"

"My last program update occurred twenty-five years, seven months and twelve days ago, on —"

"Never mind, I remember," Harry grumbled. "Let me know when that's ready." _Three, two, one_…

"It's ready now, sir," Clarke said, and the top compartment's interior light came on, showing a tray containing a plate of steaming eggs, bacon, sausage, slices of butter-toasted bread, and a bowl of piping hot oatmeal. Also on the tray was a set of silverware and a cloth napkin.

"Of course," Harry said, but he smiled as he took the food out, inhaling the aroma of the eggs and sausages, his mouth already watering. "Thanks, Clarke."

"You're welcome, sir," it said, and Harry placed the tray on the table, then took his empty water glass back to the icebox. He put the glass in the dispenser enclosure and said, "Pumpkin juice, ice cold," and the dispenser filled the glass with orange liquid. Harry placed the glass of juice on the tray with his breakfast and sat down to eat.

He went through the meal almost mechanically, scooping up eggs, then oatmeal, then having a bite of sausage or bacon and a nibble at the toast and continuing that pattern, chewing his food and swallowing. It tasted good, but Harry was quite used to his breakfasts, and didn't think much about them anymore. He remembered days long past, when he and Ron would pile their plates high with food and wolf it down like ravenous beasts, as Hermione looked on, an eyebrow raised in incredulity at the amount of food they were able to put away, especially Ron, who always seemed to be hungry. But these days…

Harry pushed the plate away. It still held about half the eggs he'd gotten, though most of the bacon and all of the sausages were gone, as well as the toast. The oatmeal bowl was still mostly full — he hadn't really had an appetite for it this morning. He picked up the tray and walked over to the Clarke and put the tray in the bottom compartment. The Clarke would recycle the materials for later reuse.

"How was your breakfast, sir?" the Clarke asked him, as he closed the bottom compartment door.

"Good, good," Harry murmured. "I wasn't as hungry as I thought, though."

"If you know what you'd like for lunch, sir," the Clarke suggested, "I can have it prepared for you by your usual time."

But Harry shook his head. "Too full to think about food again right now. I'll get back to you later, okay?"

"That would be most excellent, sir."

Harry grunted and walked into the living room, moving over to the chair he always sat in to read. The book he'd been reading was on the small table next to Hermione's picture. He picked up the book and opened it, then realized he'd forgotten to put on his glasses this morning. "Oh, bother! Now where did I leave those things?" If they weren't in his pocket (he checked; they weren't) and they weren't on the table next to the book, then… he had no idea. Harry sighed gustily. He didn't fancy spending time searching the house for his spectacles — besides, they'd only be in the last place he looked. Harry smiled at the old joke. Of course they'd be there because, after you found something, you stopped looking for it! Fortunately, there was an easier solution.

Reaching into a pocket, Harry pulled out his wand and said, "_Accio_ glasses!" Within a few moments a pair of glasses came speeding through the air, and he caught them clumsily in his free hand. Fortunately, experience had taught him, and the Unbreakable Charm he'd placed on them kept the glasses from breaking as he caught them. Unlike his round frames, which he hadn't needed in some time, these were reading glasses; ironically the lenses were in the shape of half-moons, like the glasses Professor Dumbledore had used, long ago.

Another person Harry hadn't thought of in a long time: Professor Dumbledore, his headmaster at Hogwarts for his first four years there. The last he'd seen of the professor was shortly after the defeat of Lord Voldemort, when he and the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor James Monroe, had decided to take a summer trip together. It had been a happy time for Harry — Hermione, whom he thought had been killed by Voldemort at the end of the Triwizard Tournament during the last task, had only been mostly dead; Monroe found a way to revive her, and they'd planned a celebratory trip to Paris, with Hermione's parents. But when they returned to Hogwarts the following September, they found Professor McGonagall installed as the new Headmistress, with Remus Lupin the new DADA teacher. Also, amazingly, Lupin's lycanthropy was in remission, cured by improvements to the Wolfsbane Potion, which had been introduced by none other than Professor Snape! Lupin spent several years teaching at Hogwarts, and while he and Snape never became friends, they both held a tolerant respect for each other's abilities.

Sighing at the number of old memories that had been sparked in him this morning, Harry tried to settle down and read, but had no sooner opened the book than there was a knock at his door. Who could that be? Harry thought, annoyed. There were very few people living in Godric's Hollow these days — the few people he still knew understood they should call or text Clarke before coming over. He considered simply not answering the door. Bu no — Clarke would start asking questions about how he felt and whether he felt depressed or isolated, and Harry didn't want to be psychoanalyzed by a bloody home appliance! "Coming!" he called out, then hove himself out of his chair with a grunt and slouched over to the front door. He opened it and groaned inwardly.

Two young men stood outside his door, both in slacks, white shirts and dark ties, and both smiling genially at him. Harry'd had young men like this at his door before, trying to get him to listen to stories about their religion. "Sorry, boys," he said, before either of them could speak. "I'm not really interested in hearing about the Bible or the book of whatever it is you want to talk about, so if you'll excuse me —"

"Sorry, sir," one of them interrupted. "We're not here to preach to you. We work for NanoCasts, an independent and user-run vee-cast site on the Webnet. We recently learned that the famous Harry Potter —"

_Oh, no, here we go again_! Harry thought disgustedly. _Will they never leave me alone, even after all these years_?

"— was living in Godric's Hollow, and we wanted to do a vee-cast on you, as a retrospective of your victory over the Dark wizard Lord Voldemort, and recognition of your 140th birthday."

Harry blinked. "Is that how old I am? I guess I stopped counting at 98."

The young men both smiled. "It's today, in fact. Happy birthday, Mr. Potter!"

"Hmph. Thanks," Harry grunted. "But I don't know about all this —"

"Oh, it won't take long," the other young man said. "We'll just do a short interview, ask you some questions about what you've been doing since your epic battle with Lord Voldemort, and use some archive trideo for the rest of the piece."

Harry dithered. "I don't think anyone's gonna want to see a broken down old wizard knocking around his house in his dotage."

"Well," the first young man said, trying to coax him, "we will be publishing this on the Webnet, so it will be going out on GalaxyNet as well. If you have friends, relatives or descendants anywhere in the galaxy, they'll be able to pick up this story."

Harry didn't answer immediately, but stood looking into the distance, seemingly lost in thought. _Perhaps it's time_, he pondered, _to set the record straight_. _After one hundred and twenty-five years, I suppose I've lived the lie long enough_.

"Uh, sir?" One of the young men touched him on the shoulder, in concern. "Are you all right?"

Harry blinked and looked at them. "Tell you what," he suggested. "If you want, I'll give you the whole story of my life. Including what _really_ happened with Voldemort, if you'll record it with your vee-thingy and put it out for everyone to see."

"Really?" Both young men seemed excited by this offer. "We'd love that!" the second young man continued. "I'm a real fan of yours, Mr. Potter!"

"Me, too!" the first one agreed. "It would be absolutely gluonic to hear your story!" Harry didn't know what that meant, but it sounded positive.

"Come on in, then," he said, waving them into the house. They stepped inside, looking around his living room. "Where do you want to do this?"

"Wherever you feel comfortable, sir," the first one said. "Do you use this chair here? We can have you sit — oh!" He was staring at the picture of Hermione. "I see you have a photograph of Hermione Granger-Weasley there!"

"Yeah," Harry said, gruffly. He wished he'd moved it before letting them in!

"It's an old-style picture, too," the young man went on looking at it until Harry reached over and laid it flat. "Uh, sorry — did I do something wrong?"

"No," Harry lied. "It's just a picture of a friend I keep for old time's sake." It wasn't as if he didn't want to talk about Hermione, but he also didn't want to talk _too much_ about her — there were some things in his life he'd prefer to keep to himself, even if he did plan to reveal his big secret about the defeat of Voldemort.

"I'll sit in the chair," Harry said, nodding at it. "But before we do anything, I have some questions I'd like answered."

"Of course," the first young man replied. "Anything you want to know." He looked around, but the only other furniture in the living room was a divan. "Do you mind if we find some chairs?"

"I can make a couple," Harry offered, reaching for his wand. "I _am_ a wizard, you know."

"Thank you, sir," the second young man said, politely. "But don't trouble yourself — we can manage." Drawing a wand of his own, the young man flourished it twice, causing two plush recliners to appear. Harry nodded approvingly, impressed with the young man's ability. Both young men sat down facing Harry. "You said you had some questions for us," the young man prompted.

"Yes," Harry nodded, rubbing his stubbly chin. "Just a few, to get a feel for who I'll be telling my story to. For instance, how many people are currently living on Earth?"

The first one answered. "I think the current estimates are about two million humans. The number has been steadily decreasing for the past forty years, as more and more people opt to upload to the Web."

That was a fact Harry could attest to, as a number of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, some of whom he'd never met in the flesh, had done so over the past half-century. Even Fred and George Weasley had gone into the Web several decades ago, just as they had turned 100. Harry remembered his last face-to-face conversation with them, when they told him they'd had one hundred years in the flesh, now they wanted to see what electronic life was like. "D'you know how many people are in the Web now?" Harry asked.

"That's harder to estimate," the second one answered. "But the most reliable number is about fifteen trillion. Of that, the estimated number of people who have uploaded is about 35 billion. The rest are Arts." _Arts_ was the most accepted term for a person whose mind had been artificially constructed from models of optimized human brain structures.

"That's a pretty big audience," Harry muttered. "I don't think I can get my head around a number that big."

"Well, if it helps," the first young man offered, "fifteen trillion miles is about 2.5 light-years, which is not even as far as it is from here to Proxima Centauri, which is about four and a quarter light-years away."

Harry laughed. "That didn't help," he said. The young man smiled wryly.

"What other questions do you have, Mr. Potter?" the other young man asked.

"Well, you might tell me your names," Harry suggested. "So I don't have to call you 'Hey' and 'You'."

Both young men chuckled. "Sorry," the first one said. "I'm Jim." Jim was a bit shorter than the other young man, Harry had noticed, with hazel eyes. Unlike the current trend in both men and women, he did not shave his head, but had dark brown hair, cut above the ears, and short in the back.

"And I'm Al," the second one added. He had hair, like Jim, though it was reddish-brown, with deep blue eyes. He had a goatee and, above it, a long nose. "Sorry we didn't introduce ourselves earlier, sir! I guess we were just too caught up in meeting you."

"No problem," Harry demurred. "I suppose I've forgotten my manners as well — would either of you like something to drink?"

They glanced at one another. "Sure," Jim said. "That would be finest! What do you have?"

"I can get anything you want," Harry offered. "Water, tea, butterbeer, pumpkin juice, soda…"

"I'd like a soda," Jim said. "Any kind of cola is fine."

"Tea would be nice," Al decided. "Iced, if you don't mind — it's a warm day."

Nodding, Harry produced his wand and flicked it in front of them. A small table appeared with three glasses on it. Next to Jim's ice-filled glass was an ice-cold packet of Pepsi Ultimate, while Al's glass was already filled with ice cubes and amber liquid, a slice of lemon set on the rim. His own glass was filled with cold pumpkin juice. While Jim emptied the packet into his glass Harry and Al both tasted their drinks.

"Ahhh," Al sighed, after tasting the tea. "It's been a while since I had a glass of really good tea." He looked over as Jim sipped at his cola. "Much better than that 'soft drink' rubbish — there are much better ways to partake of sugar."

Jim chuckled into his glass. "This is the nectar of the gods, dude. I think you need to give it another chance."

Al lifted his glass. "I'll stay with tea, thank you very much."

"Why don't we get started?" Harry suggested, not caring to hear idle banter between the two young men. "Where are the cameras, or whatever you use for recording pictures?"

"Oh, it's a little more sophisticated than that, sir," Jim said, taking out a small cylinder. "We use a foglet vee-deo array to record from a surround perspective. The audience will be able to experience your interview from any angle they choose, or multiple angles at once, depending on their viewing device." He clicked a button on the side of the cylinder and a fine mist seemed to spray out of it, quickly dispersing into the air. "Okay, we're ready. If you want to say something off the record, just let us know and we'll stop recording," he told Harry.

Harry looked around. He could see nothing in the air around him, but there were supposedly thousands of tiny "foglets," or miniature robots, that could record images and construct a virtual three-dimensional views of whatever they recorded. While he could create realistic three-dimensional illusions with magic, and even transfigure inanimate objects to make them act as if alive, concepts such as uploading and objects like foglets mystified him. "Before we get started, I have another question," he said.

"What is it?" Al asked.

"You said earlier there were about two million humans on Earth today," Harry recalled. "When you first showed up at my door I didn't think either of you were wizards, but at least one of you —" he gestured toward Al "— has a wand. I wanted to know about how many of that two million are wizards."

Al and Jim exchanged surprised glances. "Uh, they all are," Jim said.

Harry looked shocked. "But what about Squibs?" Some wizards in his day were born without magic — he remembered Mrs. Figg, his batty old neighbor from when he lived on Privet Drive, who'd turned out to be one, as well as Mr. Filch, the caretaker at Hogwarts.

"They found a cure for that not long after the gene therapies that allowed normal humans to become magical were developed," Jim replied. "In fact, the current therapies now allow witches and wizards to perform wandless magic at the same level as with a wand."

Harry shook his head. "Magic without a wand? I hadn't thought about that in a long time. I remember the first magic I learned was from a book on wandless magic."

"I —" Jim stopped, then asked, "Really?"

"Yeah," Harry nodded, remembering. He looked around at a bookcase standing nearby. "I still have that book. I wonder…" He extended his hand, trying to remember the techniques he'd learned so long ago. One of the books in the bookcase wobbled, then floated over to him. He held it so Jim and Al could see it.

"_A History of British Birdwatching_," Al read off the cover. 'That doesn't seem very magic-related."

"You have to concentrate," Harry told them, "as if you're trying to see just below the cover." Al and Jim concentrated on the cover, then both of them smiled.

"Ah! I see it now," Al said. "_A Young Wizard's Guide to Wandless Magic_! How long have you had that book, Mr. Potter?"

"It was given to me when I was eight years old," Harry said, turning the book around to look at its cover as well. "On my eighth birthday, in fact."

"Who gave it to you?" Al asked.

"Professor James Monroe," Harry replied at once.

"Wasn't he the Hogwarts teacher who broke the curse Lord Voldemort placed on the position when Professor Dumbledore refused to hire him for the job?" Jim asked. "How did you know him when you were only eight years old?"

"He lived in my neighborhood in Little Whinging when I was a kid," Harry replied. "I never knew why back then, but he wanted to help me learn magic. He got me this book, let me read a lot of other books on magic at his house. He got me my first wand, even before I was supposed to have one. When he left Hogwarts, he also left me his house, which had a library in its basement that had books even the Hogwarts library didn't have! By the time I left Hogwarts I'd read every one of those books, all thirteen thousand, nine hundred and sixty-two of them."

"Sufferin' succotash!" exclaimed Jim. "That's a lot of books to read!"

"It was," Harry agreed. "But he was my mentor and when he left, his books and his house were all I had to remember him by. I wanted to do something to honor him, as well as Professor Dumbledore. Since both of them read a great number of books, I thought reading all of Professor Monroe's books would be a fitting tribute to him."

"So, is Professor Monroe the one who trained you to defeat Lord Voldemort?" Jim asked, shrewdly.

Harry looked at him a long moment. Finally, he said, "I suppose we ought to start the interview, so I can answer that question."

"Okay," Jim said. He pressed a control on the cylinder that had released the foglets. "We're rolling. Al, you want to do the intro?"

"Certainly," Al said. He cleared his throat, then began. "Hello! We're here in the quiet little town of Godric's Hollow, population about fifty — including the legendary Harry Potter, long-renowned as the person who defeated Lord Voldemort in June 1995. Now, one hundred and twenty-five years later, we are here with Mr. Potter on his 140th birthday to reveal to you the exciting details of that epic battle between the Boy-Who-Lived and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."

Turning to Harry, Al said, "Good morning, Mr. Potter."

"Good morning, Al," Harry replied.

"Thank you for taking the time to talk to us on your birthday," Al went on, conversationally. "I'm sure you have a lot of activities planned for today!"

"Sure," Harry said evenly. "A lot of reading, a lot of farting, and a lot of sleeping."

Al laughed nervously and looked over at Jim. "Keep going," Jim said, prompting him. "We can deal with the outtakes later."

Al nodded and looked back at Harry. "What can you tell us about that historic day, Mr. Potter?"

Harry had put on a very serious face. "I'm glad to have this opportunity to clear the air, Al. For over one hundred years the world has known that Harry Potter defeated Lord Voldemort, ending the greatest threat to wizard and Muggle freedom since the defeat of Grindelwald fifty years earlier.

"But today I'd like to tell you what _really_ happened on that day at Malfoy Manor, when I and six other wizards found Voldemort and a small group of Death Eaters holed up there. History has recorded that Voldemort and I dueled, and that I killed him. But that was all a lie. I did not kill Lord Voldemort."

Jim and Al looked at one another, amazement on their faces. "But — but — if you didn't kill Voldemort," Jim sputtered, "who did?"

"My Aunt Petunia."

**Author's Note: Now that 140-year old Harry Potter has owned up to his awful secret — he never actually defeated Voldemort — what will happen next?**


	2. He Played Two

**Ex Machina III**

**Chapter Two**

**He Played Two**

Jim and Al were staring at one another, flabbergasted. "_Your Aunt Petunia_?" Jim sputtered. "But — but she was a non-magical, wasn't she? How could she _possibly_ have killed Lord Voldemort?"

"Both she and my cousin Dudley became magical," Harry told them. "They were given a special potion made by Professor Monroe that gave them their magic. Professor Dumbledore told me that Professor Monroe made the potion only for Dudley, but that Dudley must have held back some of the potion to give to his mother, probably by not swallowing all of it."

Jim made a face. "Ewww, that sounds gross!"

"But wait a minute," Al interjected. "What happened to them — your aunt and cousin, I mean? We know that your uncle Vernon died during some kind of robbery at a neighbor's house, during your first year."

"He was actually killed by Voldemort," Harry replied. Both Jim and Al rocked back in their chairs, stunned by this remark. "The Ministry of Magic made it look like a robbery-murder; the Muggle police had gotten involved, somehow, and they had quite a time Obliviating everyone who'd been in Mrs. Figg's house and seen the bodies. Voldemort had killed her, too."

"Who was Mrs. Figg?" Al asked.

"Well, for a long time I thought she was just a batty old lady who liked cats," Harry said, remembering the woman with her frumpy dress, hairnet and tartan slippers, and the string bag she always seemed to carry around. "My aunt and uncle would call to have me stay with her whenever they took a trip someplace and couldn't just lock me in my room.

"Then I found out that she was really there to watch me — Professor Dumbledore had asked her to move to Little Whinging and keep an eye on me while I stayed with the Dursleys."

"How did you find that out?" Al asked.

"Professor Monroe told me," Harry answered. "I think he was doing the same thing, looking out for me, but _he_ wasn't working for Professor Dumbledore. At least, he wasn't back then. He lived a few blocks away, but I didn't meet him until the day he gave me the book on wandless magic."

"Let's get back to your aunt and Voldemort," Al suggested. "You said that she killed Voldemort, not you. Can you tell us how that happened?"

Harry had almost forgotten that he was giving an interview. "Oh, yeah. Well, we'd located all of Voldemort's Horcruxes using a spell Professor Monroe knew, and had found and destroyed all of them except the final one, his snake Nagini. Because of that spell, we also knew that after the Triwizard Tournament he had holed up with a few of his Death Eaters at Malfoy Manor, so a group of us went there to confront him once and for all, before he could become powerful again."

"And this included your aunt?" Al asked.

"No," Harry shook his head. "She'd overheard our plans to find the Horcruxes, and knew we were going after Voldemort. But Voldemort had killed Dudley, who was with —" Harry took a deep breath "— with H-Hermione and me when we got to the Triwizard trophy, during the final task. Professor Monroe thought it might be a Portkey that would take whoever touched it to Voldemort, but actually _Dudley_ had been made into a living Portkey — he touched both me and Hermione, and we ended up captured by Death Eaters. Dudley had been tricked into restoring Voldemort's original body; it seemed like he'd been promised he could have Hermione if he did so."

"That's awful," Al muttered, shaking his head in disbelief.

"Yeah, I thought so, too," Harry said, feelingly. "I didn't think Dudley even _liked_ Hermione — they never got along, the few times they were together."

"Maybe somebody did something to Dudley to make him like her," Jim speculated. "Like giving him the Amortentia potion — that would have made him obsess over her, and promising him he could have her might make him do just about anything — even join Voldemort's side."

"Hmm," Harry grunted. "I hadn't thought of that — I just thought Dudley was being a pig, as usual."

"Anyway," Al prompted, trying to move things along. "How did your aunt get involved in the final battle?"

"She was already at Malfoy Manor when we got there," Harry said, his face darkening with anger remembered anew from that day. "Voldemort had tortured her. He knew we were coming, and he demanded that he and I duel or he would kill her. Naturally I accepted, since that's what we were there for, but we had to destroy the last Horcrux before he could be permanently killed — the only way to do that was with the Sword of Gryffindor, and no one had thought to bring it with us!"

"But," Al protested. "I thought the snake _was_ killed with the Sword of Gryffindor! That's what all the old newspapers said at the time."

"It was," Harry agreed. "Professor Dumbledore had brought along the Sorting Hat, which also had belonged to Godric Gryffindor. Only a true Gryffindor can pull the sword from the hat, and I was able to do that."

"Then you killed the snake," Al surmised, smiling.

"No," Harry said, and Al's smile disappeared. "Unfortunately, though I had the sword, Voldemort cast a spell protecting the snake before I could kill it."

"Then how was it killed?" Al asked.

"Petunia killed it," Harry answered, deadpan. Al and Jim looked at each other, once again surprised.

"It's beginning to sound like everything we know is wrong!" Jim exclaimed. "The Ministry newspaper at the time, the_ Daily Prophet_, wrote that you killed Voldemort, and made no mention of your aunt or the snake, or any of the other Horcruxes."

"Horcruxes were a big secret at the time," Harry explained. "Only Professor Dumbledore and Professor Monroe seemed to know anything about them back then. I don't think any of the Death Eaters did — maybe Bellatrix Lestrange, but it's hard to say for sure."

Al was nodding. "Ironic, isn't it? Horcruxes are pretty much obsolete magic today, since anyone can use biotechnology to make themselves resistant to all diseases and aging, and we can make backup scans of our brains so that if anything happens to us, our last backup can be reprogrammed into a clone of our body."

Harry shrugged. "But it was different back then — a Horcrux would make you impossible to permanently kill, as long as you had one. But to _make_ a Horcrux, you had to murder someone to split your soul and put that fragment into the Horcrux. It was extremely Dark magic!"

"Oh," Al said, surprised. "Oh! I didn't realize _that_! That would be _horrible_!"

"And Voldemort did it six times," Harry said. "More than that, really."  
"What do you mean, 'more than that'?" Jim asked. "I read Hermione Granger-Weasley's biography of him, and she wrote that he split his soul into seven pieces, since seven is the most magically powerful number."

Harry hadn't thought he'd mention it, but there was no use holding anything back, now. He brushed back the white hair covering his forehead, revealing the lightning scar there. "When Voldemort tried to kill me when I was one year old, he left this scar."

Al nodded. "Yes, it's the most recognizable scar in the world today."

Harry chuckled mirthlessly as he ruffled the hair back over his forehead. "I think you exaggerate its importance, Al. It's just a scar. But what I didn't know, back then, was that when Voldemort's spell backfired and destroyed him, it tore away a small piece of his soul, which implanted itself in the only other living body there — mine."

"Wow," Al breathed. "So you actually had a bit of Voldemort's _soul_ in you?"

"Yeah," Harry nodded. "I found out that's how I knew how to speak Parseltongue, for example. Since I got rid of the fragment, I can't speak it today."

"How did you get it out of you?" Jim asked. "Did Dumbledore find a way to remove it?"

"No," Harry shook his head. "Voldemort killed me."

"He _what_?" Jim asked, dumbfounded. "What do you mean?"

"He killed me," Harry repeated. "I was dead — or at least, as close as I ever got to being dead."

"How did he kill you?" This question from Al.

"The Killing Curse," Harry replied.

"Don't take this wrong, sir," Al said, sounding a bit doubtful. "But you should be dead, then."

Harry grinned. "I agree. I remember thinking I _was_ dead, and wasn't sure what was going to happen next. I was alone, in a dark place, until Professor Monroe showed up and convinced me I should come back and finish the battle. I wasn't sure I wanted to — I thought Hermione was dead, and I — well, I was pretty unhappy about that. I found out the reason I wasn't completely dead was that when Voldemort was restored to his body, he had Dudley use some of my blood in his spell. Because of the blood protection spell in my blood, my soul was anchored to this world, just as his was. When he killed me, I went to some 'holding place' to decide what I should do. Voldemort was there as well, probably the bit that was in my scar, but all it could do was scream and cry, it was so tiny and shredded.."

"And Professor Monroe showed up?" Al repeated, sounding confused. "That doesn't make any sense. If you were dead, then how could _he_ show up where you were, unless he was dead, too?"

"Professor Monroe was a pretty amazing wizard," Harry told him. "He could do a lot of things most wizards couldn't — he knew more spells than anyone I'd ever met before — like I said, the library in his house had books even Hogwarts library didn't have! — and he hadn't even _gone_ to Hogwarts."

"Where _did_ he get his magical education?" Al asked, glancing at Jim.

"I dunno," Harry shrugged. "He never told me. But he was the smartest wizard I ever met. I think he was even smarter than Professor Dumbledore, though he never tried to show the professor up or anything like that."

"You were no slouch yourself, Mr. Potter," Jim spoke up. "You sat for and got O.W.L.s in all twelve subjects, and received straight O's. Two years later you got seven more O's in your N.E.W.T.s. You probably could have written your own ticket anywhere in the Wizarding world at the time, and yet you chose to become an Auror, which took you three more years of training."

"I thought it was important," Harry explained, "to keep fighting wizards who took the easy way of Dark magic. Voldemort was gone, but so was Professor Dumbledore, and Professor Monroe as well. I could have gone into magical research in the Ministry (in fact, I did, eventually!) but at the time I thought it was more important to keep people safe. And since Kingsley Shacklebolt became Minister for Magic around that time, the Ministry became a much better governing body than it had been under Cornelius Fudge."

"You had a pretty distinguished career at the Ministry, according to the _Prophet's_ archives," Jim said, admiringly. "I'm surprised you never made Head Auror, though."

"I thought about it," Harry admitted. "Kingsley offered it to me, just as he was getting ready to retire; it had been vacant for a few months after Zabini was killed —"

"Wait," Jim said. "_Blaise_ Zabini? Wasn't he a Slytherin?"

"So?" Harry said, giving him a sharp look. "I got to know him during my last three years at Hogwarts — he was a pretty good guy, once he saw what a dead end the Dark Arts were. He didn't want any part of them. He, Ron Weasley and I went into Auror Training together after we left Hogwarts."

"You haven't mentioned Ron Weasley much," Al commented. "Or his sister Ginny, for that matter." He pointed to the picture lying face down on the table next to Harry. "I suppose I expected that picture to be of her, considering you two were married all those years. Is there something to all that that you don't want to tell…"

Al's comment had trailed off as he saw the expression on Harry's face — he was giving Al a rather piercing glare. "Let me tell you something, boy," he said in a tight, controlled voice. "Ron Weasley was my friend and my partner for many years. We had our difficulties over the years, there's no denying that. But he'll always be my friend, and I'll never say anything against him. And that goes double for Ginny!

"She and I fell in love and got married several years before she started working at the _Prophet_ as their Quidditch reporter," Harry went on, leaning forward to make sure he had their undivided attention. "We had three wonderful children and a great time together, and I wouldn't have missed it for anything! Are we clear now on the issue of Ron and Ginny?"

"Yes, sir," both Jim and Al nodded, in subdued voices. "But, you must admit," Al went on, "she did eventually leave you."

Harry sat back slowly in his chair, sighing and rubbing his temples, as if massaging a sharp pain. "Yes, she did," he said at last. He dropped his hands and gave Al a disconsolate look. "And it was all my fault. I was getting into too many things, and taking her for granted. Ron kept trying to get me to spend time with her; he kept inviting us out with him and Hermione, but I — I couldn't — couldn't spare the time," Harry finished, faltering, and sounding very unconvincing.

But Al merely nodded. "You were into quite a few things back then, weren't you?" he asked. "It seemed like a lot of the advances you brought to Wizarding society were in response to the technological advances non-magical societies were discovering about that time as well."

Harry shook his head. "Truth to tell, I didn't pay Muggle society much mind after I left Hogwarts. I'd spent my first ten years living in it, and it wasn't very pleasant for me. I guess the best thing I could say about it is, it could have been worse."

"How could it have been worse?" Al asked, surprised. "You were forced to live with your non-magical aunt, uncle and cousin, all of whom hated you! You were forced to cook and clean for them, do chores around the house while your cousin lounged around and bullied you. I don't know how it could have been worse than that!"

"Well, it actually _was_ worse than that," Harry replied matter-of-factly. "I discovered at one point that my aunt and uncle were being paid to take care of me, but using most of the money for themselves, for trips and presents for my cousin Dudley. I wasn't very happy to learn that my only known relatives were taking care of me just for the money!" Al and Jim could only nod, both riveted and revolted by what Harry was telling them.

"But it could have been worse," Harry said again. "They didn't beat me, and other than Dudley, didn't so much bully me as order me about, like I was nothing more than their paid servant, when the truth was, they were being paid to take care of _me_. But, I had other friends in the neighborhood, and at school, and after I started learning magic, things got more bearable around the house, mainly because I knew I could take care of myself around them after that."

"There had been some rumors," Al said, a bit tentatively, as if he were afraid of Harry getting cross with them again, "that you were controlling your aunt and uncle with magic." Harry chuckled. "Is that a yes?" Al asked.

"I made suggestions from time to time," Harry replied, with an offhanded shrug. "But I've heard those rumors, too, and they seem to suggest I used the Imperius Curse on them. I never did that. I never wanted to use any of the Unforgivables on anyone."

"But did you?" Al persisted. "Even as an Auror? I know sometimes Aurors were given a 'License to Curse' — permission from the Ministry to use the Unforgivables on Dark wizards."

"_That_ was under Head Auror Barty Crouch, Senior," Harry replied, sharply. "And whether he did so with the Minister of Magic's approval at the time is still an unsettled question as far as I'm concerned. Kingsley _never_ gave permission to use the Unforgivables. And I would never have used them even if he did."

"Okay," Al said, putting his hands up in mock surrender. "I just wanted to get your thoughts on that —"

"Well, you got 'em," Harry snapped. But then he softened a bit. "Okay, look, I'm not trying to bite your head off, kid. I spent over 30 years as an Auror, and we got a lot of good things accomplished in that time at the Ministry."

"And afterwards, too," Jim added. "When you went into magical research after you retired from the Aurors you made quite a few discoveries in the next few decades!"

Al reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a folded piece of parchment. "I have a list here of some of your better-known accomplishments. Let's see, in 2038 you developed the multi-core wand, in partnership with Fred and George Weasley, who'd been working for decades on a wand design that would exceed even an Ollivander wand. In 2042 the Weasleys came out with an improved Longevity Potion, originally developed by Severus Snape. Snape's potion was very difficult and costly to make, but theirs was relatively cheap and plentiful, though they said it was their "biggest money spinner" of all time. I mention it," Al looked up at Harry, "because there's a rumor that you helped them develop it."

Harry said nothing.

"Anyway," Al went on, when it became obvious Harry wasn't going to comment, "in 2047 you developed a new broom, the Sonic One Thousand, capable of speeds up to 700 miles per hour, allowing for transcontinental and transoceanic flights in less than half a day's flight. And even though you could have asked for exorbitant sums for each one, you priced them at only a thousand Galleons each, less than the original Firebolt cost when it first came out."

"I wasn't trying to develop a Quidditch broom," Harry pointed out. "It was meant for straight flying performance and for safety, not maneuverability. Even if you were somehow knocked unconscious while flying it at speed, a special set of Shield Charms would activate, holding you in place, and the broom would send out message to all Wizard's Wireless units within a hundred mile radius. We also incorporated an "autopilot" spell in it that worked sort of like using the Floo Network — you could state the location you wished to travel to, and the broom would travel there, avoiding Muggle-inhabited areas. The only downside to that feature was that you had to know the location you were traveling to — otherwise, the broom couldn't find it."

"It might be cool to ride one of those," Jim mused, looking at Al, who stared at him as if he were crazy.

"I wouldn't go up in one of those things!" Al declared. "Traveling at 700 miles an hour? Not a chance!"

"Mr. Potter just _said_ it was foolproof!" Jim said, sounding exasperated. "Maybe you think you're a bigger fool than even _he_ accounted for!"

"Oh, that's rich, coming from you!" Al sniffed. "You couldn't even find this _house_, and it's one of the few in this town that's still occupied!"

"Will you two cut it out?" Harry groused, irritated. "Even Professors Monroe and Dumbledore didn't argue like you two, and I'm pretty sure they didn't even like —" he suddenly cut himself off, looking at the two of them.

"Like what?" Al asked, after several moments of silence.

"Uh — each other," Harry finished, thinking. _What_ he was thinking was fantastic, impossible — but impossible things had been happening around the world for decades now, and Harry himself was responsible for some of them.

But how would he test them? Albus Dumbledore and James Monroe were two of the smartest wizards he'd ever met. It would be difficult to trick them. But that was what Aurors were trained to do, among other things — trick people into giving up information, often without realizing they'd done so.

If he was right, then these two young men, Jim and Al, were actually Professors Monroe and Dumbledore! Both of them were now looking at him, surprised by his last comment. "What makes you think they didn't like one another?" Al asked. "We researched all of your teachers through the _Prophet_ archives on Webnet, and there's no indication of hostility between the headmaster and Monroe. In fact, one of the last mentions of them said that they were planning a vacation together at the end of your fourth year, when Lord Voldemort was finally defeated."

"I think by then they had settled any differences they had," Harry surmised. "But when I first saw them together, I sensed some tension between them. I _know_ there must've been some, since Professor Dumbledore came to my aunt and uncle's house once, to tell them he had nothing to do with what James Monroe was doing."

"Which was what?" Al asked.

"He'd been visiting them a few times a year since I'd come there, to check up on me and make sure they were treating me okay. He was also the one who brought the payments by every month, the money they got for taking care of me."

Al looked at Jim, eyebrows arching upwards. "That's quite a revelation! Nobody knew that Professor Monroe had known you all that time! So you'd known Monroe since you were a child?" he asked Harry.

"Not quite," Harry averred. "Like I said earlier, I didn't meet him until I was eight years old, when he gave me the book on wandless magic. And I didn't see him again after that until my ninth birthday, when he invited me over to his house to see his library collection. He said I could come over and read the books anytime. And he got me a wand for my ninth birthday as well." That last statement was false — Harry hadn't gotten a wand until his tenth birthday, but he wanted to see if either of the two men would take the bait he was dangling in front of them.

Al looked thoughtful. "I don't think that's quite right, Mr. Potter," he said. "I think you were ten when you got your wand."

"Oh?" Harry gave him an inquiring look. "Why do you say that?"

"Well, you gave an interview to Rita Skeeter in your fifth year, for the _Prophet_, and one of the things she printed about you was that you'd had an illegal wand when you were ten years old. Nothing ever came of it, of course," he smiled, with a shrug. "The Ministry was so happy to be rid of Voldemort that they never even bothered to investigate how you could have used an illegal wand without being caught."

"Hmph," Harry grunted. "I'd almost forgot about that myself. It was because I didn't have the Trace on me — Professor Monroe removed it before we went to get the wand." He had forgotten about that interview! Well, not that he'd ever read it — Hermione had read it to him, livid over the way Skeeter had pilloried him in the press, the day it came out in the _Prophet_. Harry would have to think of some other way to trip these boys up.

"Yeah," Jim agreed. "That was kind of a defining moment, wasn't it — even though you couldn't have realized it at the time, but when Kingsley Shacklebolt became Minister for Magic in 1998 and he and Hermione Granger started introducing reforms to how the Ministry dealt with half-bloods and Muggle-borns, one of the things they pushed through was a change to how the Trace operated. From 2004 on it became strictly a location enchantment — it no longer informed the Ministry when magic was performed in the vicinity of the underage wizard, a change that gave more freedom to students to practice their magic while away from Hogwarts."

Harry remembered. His son James Sirius had been born in 2004, the year after he and Ginny had gotten married. The year 2002 had also been a big one for Ginny: she'd played in the Quidditch World Cup on the British National Team as Seeker; they lost to Ireland in the final, after a hard-fought game lasting three hours, when Ginny caught the Golden Snitch just as one of the British Chasers made a shot. The shot was blocked, and the score ended up tied at 220 apiece. Since the final couldn't end in a tie, a 10-minute overtime period was played; Ireland easily outscored Britain, winning the game 310 to 250.

Ginny played six more years, retiring from the Holyhead Harpies at the end of the 2010 season to take care of their children, James Sirius, Albus Severus, born in 2006, and Lily Luna, born in 2008. She tried out for the British National Team again in 2010, just before announcing her retirement, but was not picked up for the Quidditch World Cup. The British team went on to a dismal showing in the World Cup, coming in eighth place.

"What are you thinking about, Mr. Potter?" Al asked, and Harry realized he'd been daydreaming rather than talking. Of course, when you were 140 years old your mind could wander off at the drop of a hat. He looked at their drinks, thinking to get them refills, when his eye fell on the slice of lemon on Al's tea glass. Something about lemons…

"Do you boys want some more to drink?" Harry said, hoisting himself out of his seat to reach for their empty glasses.

"Oh, we can do that!" Al said, as both young men hurriedly stood up. "No need for you to bother, Mr. Potter!"

"Nonsense," Harry said, in a jovial tone. "You're my guests, after all! I have to get something from Clarke, anyway — something I almost forgot."

Putting the two empty glasses into Clarke's bottom compartment, Harry asked for two more glasses, one with iced tea and one with Pepsi Ultimate, as before. He also requested a third item, which Clarke cheerfully provided. A few moments later the glasses appeared in the top compartment, along with a small, white bag.

Harry stuck the bag in his pocket and carried the glasses back into his living room, where he handed them to Jim and Al. "Here you go, boys, drink up." He started to sit down, but reached into his pocket and took out the white bag, pulling something from it and popping it into his mouth. Looking up at the two young men, he proffered the bag, asking, "Care for a lemon drop?"

"Oh, yes," Al said, smiling as he reached into the bag, taking one as well. "I love lemon drops." Jim took one as well, without comment.

"Do you, now?" Harry said to Al, smiling as he sat down again in his chair. "How long have you liked them?"

Al shrugged. "Oh, my whole life, I guess. I haven't had one in — well, quite a while."

"Do you remember the first time you offered me one, Al?" Harry asked shrewdly.

Al stared at him in confusion. "The first time? I don't know what you mean, Mr. Potter — I've never met you before today."

"Sure," Harry said, turning a baleful eye on the two young men. "Two men named Al and Jim — perhaps short for _Albus_ and _James_ — come to my door to interview me for my 140th birthday. Give me a break, guys! I don't know how you managed to get here — I'm guessing time travel is involved, somehow — but you two are _so_ found out!"

But the two young men were looking at one another with astonishment on their faces. Finally Jim spoke, in a flustered tone. "Mr. Potter, it's — well, it's flattering that you think we're — I guess — James Monroe and Albus Dumbledore, but my full names is James Rem Ono."

"And I'm Albus Dub Moderel," Al said, earnestly. "We're not who you think we are — honest!"

"You'll humor me, I hope, if I'm not convinced of that," Harry said, dubiously. "Your names, the way you interact with one another — I'm pretty sure you're Monroe and Dumbledore. In fact…" he leaned over in his chair and spoke toward the kitchen. "Clarke! If you rearranged the letters of these two fellers names, leaving James and Albus alone, what names can you come up with?"

"Let's see," Clarke said thoughtfully, as if it were actually thinking, "'James Rem Ono' can be transposed to James Monroe, and 'Albus Dub Moderel' can be transposed to Albus Dumbledore, sir."

Harry smirked at the two young men. "That would be what's known as a wild coincidence. _Too_ wild in my book, boys."

Al and Jim looked at one another. "What do we do now?" Al asked, looking defeated.

"I guess we're done," Jim shrugged, and he and Al disappeared. Harry blinked. He had spells in place on his house that would keep anyone from Apparating in _or_ out — but somehow they'd defeated his wards! They'd left their equipment, though — Harry wondered if they'd be foolish enough to come back for it.

Unexpectedly, there was a chuckle from the vicinity of the empty divan. Harry stared suspiciously in the direction of his couch, moving a hand up surreptitiously so he could wandlessly cast a _Homenum_ _Revelio_ spell in its direction. The spell showed no one was there, invisible or not, but a second chuckle came from the divan. A voice spoke. "Do you think we've confused him enough for today, Albus?"

"I believe so, James," another voice, deep and clear, spoke. "And after all, we did come to talk to Harry ourselves, not merely to watch our avatars interview him."

"So it _is_ you two!" Harry cackled, grinning in spite of his astonishment at hearing their voices again. "So, was I right about the time travel — did you two find a Time Turner and use it to come 125 years into the future? Or is this because of some accident?"

"Neither, actually," Dumbledore's voice said. A moment later he appeared on the divan: still thin, white-haired and bearded, with his long crooked nose and half-moon spectacles that looked most similar to the ones Harry now used. "James and I have been off doing some adventuring." He looked at the other side of the divan. "James?"

Monroe appeared a moment later, looking exactly as Harry remembered him from a century and a quarter earlier. "Hi, Harry. I offered Albus a chance to see the universe, and he took me up on it."

"To see the universe?" Harry repeated. "When you two left, it was _decades_ before space travel was developed — even now you can only travel to other planets if you're willing to be — well, uploaded," Harry used the term with some disdain.

"And you never wanted to be uploaded, Harry?" James asked.

Harry gave a sharp shake of his head. "Never! Who'd want to be turned into some kind of machine? Not me! I'm still the same Harry Potter I was when I was fifteen years old! Well, only a few minor additions," he added, remembering. "But I'm 100 percent biological!

"Now," he said, wagging a finger at the two of them. "You'd both better explain yourselves. If you're not here because of some time travel trip or accident, how come you both look just the same as you did 125 years ago?"

James put up a placating hand. "I'll explain all of that, Harry, but before we get into it, there is one other person with us who's been quiet to this point, someone who's been wanting to say hello to you."  
Harry looked around the room, squinting. "Well, who is it?" he said at last. "I cast a Human Revealment Charm earlier but it showed nobody was in the room after Jim and Al disappeared."

"We'll explain why you couldn't as well," Albus said, gently. "But first — if you would, my dear…?" He gestured toward an empty spot between him and James on the divan.

A person faded into view, smiling at Harry, and when he saw her his heart leaped into his throat. He stared at her for some time, forgetting to breath, until she said, "Hello, Harry."

It took him several moments and three swallows before he found his voice again. She looked exactly as she did in the picture he knew so well.

"Hello, Hermione," he said at last.


	3. It's a Livin' Thing

**Ex Machina III**

**Chapter Three**  
**It's a Livin' Thing**

**Updated 19 May 2010**

Harry turned back to James and Albus. "Why are you doing this to me?" he asked, his voice raw with emotion. "Why are you bringing up these ghosts from the past? To haunt me? To make me relive the loss of everyone I cared for? _Why_?"

James looked puzzled. "Harry, I thought you'd be happy to see Hermione again," he told him. "How long has it been since you've seen her?"

"I see her every day," Harry answered, his voice cracking with anger. He tapped the side of his head. "In here. I see _my Hermione_." He dismissed the young brown-haired woman standing in front of him. "Not some artificial reality like _her_!"

"She is as real as James and I are," Albus pointed out, calmly. "She was not created by magic nor by any type of advanced technology."

Harry laughed mirthlessly, a hoarse cackle. "As real as you, Albus? You've been missing for _one hundred and twenty-five years_, and you were over one hundred years old then! You'll excuse me if I think some type of advanced technology is involved!"

Hermione stepped toward him, and Harry flinched back warily. She stopped, putting up her hands as a gesture of non-aggression, and spoke calmly, though there was tension in her voice. "Harry, please listen to me. I'm as real as you are — really!" she added, as Harry shook his head disbelievingly. "Where I came from, we knew each other for a long time before —" she hesitated, looking afraid, before blurting out in a rush "— before you-you were k-killed!"

"But I _wasn't_ killed," Harry retorted, poking himself in the chest to emphasize his presence. "See? Here I am! What kind of game are you all playing at, anyway?"

"Not a game, Harry," James said quietly. "We never told you about the other Potterverses."

A frown creased Harry's features. "The _what_? _Potterverses_? What the hell are you talking about?"

"Parallel universes, alternate dimensions and realities," James explained. "You must have heard of the idea some time in the past hundred years."

"Ehh," Harry sniffed derisively. "Science-fiction twaddle — fairy stories! You're trying to suggest that _she_ comes from an alternate dimension?" Harry jerked a thumb toward Hermione.

"Yes," Albus said simply. "As does James."

Harry gave his former headmaster a look of complete skepticism. "Right," he said condescendingly. "And I suppose _you're_ from a different dimension as well?"

"Oh, no, of course not," Albus replied, cheerfully. "I'm from this universe, just like you, Harry. The difference between us is, I've _been_ to other universes." He gestured toward Hermione once again. "Hers, for one."

"The one where I'm _dead_, right?" Harry snapped. He faced the three of them squarely. "Okay, then — let's cut to the damn chase. Let's assume —" he pointed to Albus "— that you're my old headmaster from Hogwarts, gone missing one hundred and twenty-five years ago, but now standing in my home looking not one day older than when you left!"

He turned next to James. "And for the sake of argument, we'll say that _you_ came from a different universe, though this gives me no indication what technology or magic — or _whatever_! — was used to bring you here, or why. And _you_ —!" He looked finally at Hermione, who was giving him a reproachful look "— you are someone I've known for most of my life, but _don't_ know, because you're some kind of _alternate_ version of Hermione Granger-Weasley! Does that about cover our basic premises?"

"Essentially," James nodded. "Though you've put a lot of your biases in there as well."

"Tough shite," Harry shrugged. He sat back down in his chair, leaning back and giving them a careless wave. "So let's hear it — the point of all this is for — what? Enlighten me."

"That's what we've been trying to _do_!" Hermione said, throwing up her hands in exasperation. Haven't you _wondered_ what happened to Professor Dumbledore over all those missing years? Haven't you been thinking about _me_?" She pointed accusingly at the picture frame still laying facedown on the table next to Harry's chair. "That picture certainly suggests so! Aren't you the _least bit curious_ why we'd come to you like this?"

"Like I _said_," Harry pointed out, "I'm waiting for you to enlighten me!"

"We want you to join us," James stated.

Harry put on a quizzical look. "Join you? To do what? What is it you're _doing_, that I might want to join you in? Should we find _another_ Dark Lord slayer who's lived too long past his time, and torment _him_ with images of his past life, too?"

"Harry," James said, beginning to sound annoyed by his seemingly deliberate obtuseness. "We're offering you the chance to explore other universes with us — to go places and do things you've never imagined possible. We're offering you the chance to be immortal."

"Psssh," Harry scoffed. "Already am."

"What do you mean?" Hermione's eyes had gone wide. "You didn't —"

Harry was looking at her, confused, until he realized what she must be thinking. "No, I _didn't_ create a Horcrux, if that's what you inferred, _dear_ Hermione!" he sneered. He reached into the collar of his shirt, pulling out a small beaded bag. Pulling the mouth open, he stuck his fingers in, followed by his hand, then his arm to the elbow. He seemed to rummage around inside the bag. "Hang on a mo', I'll find it — ah! There it is!" Pulling his arm out, he held out his hand, showing them a small, red roughly cut stone.

Albus's eyebrows shot up, while James smiled, and Hermione regarded the small object in Harry's hand with wonder. "Is that what I _think_ it is?" she asked, astonished. "Is that the — the Philosopher's Stone?"

Harry grinned at her, pleased that she'd understood so quickly. "Not _Flamel's_ Stone," he pointed out, "but one _I_ made, after many decades of research."

"Extraordinary," Albus murmured, looking at the stone in Harry's hand. "Nicholas always believed that it was a unique set of circumstances that allowed him to create the first one — an event not to be repeated or duplicated. It appears you have proven him wrong, Harry."

"But wait a minute," Hermione objected. "How do we _know_ that's not the original Philosopher's Stone, the one Nicholas Flamel created? Not that I doubt you, Harry," she added hastily, when Harry gave her a dirty look. "I just want to know how we'd know the difference."

"I _know_ what happened to the original Philosopher's Stone," James told her. "I used it to create the potion for Harry's cousin, Dudley Dursley, that changed him and his mother, Petunia, into magicals."

"Ah!" Hermione gasped. "Like you told Harry earlier! I _wondered_ what had been in that potion!"

Harry dropped the Stone back into the beaded bag. "So I've got immortality covered, thank you very much! So what _else_ are you offering, if I join you?"

Hermione turned to James and Albus. "Are you _sure_ that's Harry Potter?" she asked, and threw him a disgusted look. "It's like someone cut Professor Snape's hair and drew a lightning scar on his forehead!"

That earned her a venomous glare from Harry. "Well, aren't we being snippy, Miss Beaver-Teeth!" This Hermione's front teeth were still rather large; she apparently had never gotten hit with that _Densaugeo_ curse during one of Harry's duels with Malfoy, thereby giving Madam Pomfrey the opportunity to shrink them to a more cosmetically pleasing size. Hermione's face went beet-red with embarrassment, and as she turned away James stepped in, holding up a hand to call a halt to their verbal jousting.

"Okay, that's enough, from _both_ of you," he said firmly. After several moments of silence, broken only by the sound of Hermione taking deep breaths to compose herself, James continued, "Harry, look — we're not trying to trick you —"

"Which is why you showed up earlier, pretending to be vee-casters?" Harry asked, pointedly.

James looked at Albus, who shrugged. They both laughed. "Well, that started out as a prank," James admitted. "But we really didn't know the best way to approach you, after all this time."

"I guess the truth was a little too blasé?" Harry suggested, blandly.

"It was more along the lines of too much, too soon," Albus put in. "If James and I had appeared, after all these years, with Miss Granger in tow, we wondered if you might have believed your mind was going."

"Well, I still might!" Harry declared. "With all this talk of other universes and alternate realities, I might think I'm simply demented and hallucinating all of this."

"But you're not," Hermione pointed out.

"Yeah, and I should take _your_ word for it?" Harry snarled at her. She looked at him, offended.

"Can't you get it through your skull, even _now_, that I'm here because I love you?" she shouted at him. "From what James and Albus told me, you and the Hermione of this universe spent decades in an unrequited relationship, committed to other people though you loved one another! Is that true, or is it all just shite?" She glared at him, waiting for his response.

Harry looked at her for a long time before answering. "Yes, it's all true," he said at last. "Hermione and I did love one another, until we had a misunderstanding that pulled us apart, and threw each of us into someone else's arms. Even though we each married for love, I think we both knew we'd made a mistake in breaking up. But we never found the right moment, or maybe the courage, to discuss it with each other. So I was married to Ginny for 35 years, happily for many of them, and Hermione was married to Ron for over 50 years. Maybe more," Harry shrugged. "I lost track of them sometime after their 50th anniversary…" his voice trailed off, and he looked away, seemingly lost in thought.

Hermione walked over to where Harry was sitting, crouching down beside the chair. She put one of her hands on his. Harry turned away.

"Why don't you all leave, now?" he said softly, not looking at her. "I'm tired of thinking about the past. I want to forget it."

"Harry…" Hermione whispered, tears beginning to form in her eyes. But Harry would not look at her. She turned back at James and Albus, pleading silently for them to do something.

Albus moved forward, lifting her gently to her feet. "Everyone must make their own choices, Hermione," he said softly into her ear. She nodded, and with a sob she vanished.

Albus looked back at James. "I will go and make sure she's okay," he said, then turned to Harry once again. "Farewell, Harry. Perhaps we will meet again, in this reality, or in the one beyond it." He vanished as well.

James stared at Harry for several moments before crouching down to join him at eye level. "Well, Harry," he said, shrugging as Harry's eyes carefully avoided meeting his. "I hope you'll be happy here in your little self-imposed prison.

"I suppose it's ironic — I tried to give you an early start on magic, to give you an edge against Voldemort, and while you were quite a player in that drama we know that you ended up being more of a Beater than a Seeker — you made it possible for your ex-Muggle aunt to kill Voldemort rather than doing it yourself."  
Harry shook his head, but he couldn't deny the facts. Whatever Sybil's prophecy had meant, he hadn't been the one to end the Dark Lord's life.

"I suppose you'll spent the next six or seven decades trying to live that down, at least to yourself," James went on. "All of your accomplishments, both public and private — even though there's hardly anyone left on the planet that actually remembers what you did for the wizarding world."

He stood, leaving Harry slumped in the chair. "Albus and I may be back again someday — but then again, we might not. If we do, it's because we think you can make a better decision for yourself, next time we see you. For now, though, he and I are going to find some Harry Potter who's appreciate our Hermione for the person she is, not the ghost you wanted her to be. Life is for the living, Harry —and love's a living thing, though you may have forgotten that." James vanished.

It was several minutes before Harry looked up. A single tear was rolling down his cheek. "I haven't forgotten," he whispered. "But it's a terrible thing to lose, too."

The End

**Author's Note: Kind of an abrupt end to this story, I know, but I have another Harry in mind for James Monroe to meet. Watch for Ex Machina IV!**


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